As the Internet is becoming more prevalent, and users have flat-rate Internet access, the uses of the Internet are expanding. Web cams, cameras that make their images available on the Internet are becoming more prevalent.
Web cams are useful, and fun. They are becoming more common, for example in hotels that want to advertise to prospective customers. Web cams may also be used in other situations, to permit a user to look at a site from a remote location.
However, web cams have a few problems. In general, the image provider pays for bandwidth. This means that if a user loads the web cam, and then leaves, or simply fails to close the window, the image provider is paying each time the image is refreshed. This is disadvantageous to the image provider. One method of reducing this bandwidth is to only send images from the camera if there was motion, or something triggers sending the image. However, determining whether a camera is not sending a picture because it has not been triggered or because it's malfunctioning is difficult.
Therefore, an improved method of interacting with a web cam is needed.